"It requires wisdom to understand wisdom: The music is nothing if the audience is deaf."
- Walter Lippmann
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Gandhi
"It is unwise to be too sure of one's own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err."
- Mahatma Gandhi
- Mahatma Gandhi
Do The Math: Two Ears. One Mouth.
"It is the province of knowledge to speak and it is the privilege of wisdom to listen."
- Oliver Wendell Holmes
- Oliver Wendell Holmes
In The Now
"It is always wise to stop wishing for things long enough to enjoy the fragrance of those now flowering."
- Patrice Gifford
- Patrice Gifford
Sharing
"If wisdom were offered me with this restriction, that I should keep it close and not communicate it, I would refuse the gift."
- Lucius Anneaus Seneca
- Lucius Anneaus Seneca
Monday, October 3, 2011
Our WyzerCircle
"The next best thing to being wise oneself is to be in a circle with those who are."
- C. S. Lewis
- C. S. Lewis
All Those Wyzer Than I
"I love quotations because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognized wiser than oneself."
- Marlene Dietrich
- Marlene Dietrich
Seekers, Finders, Seekers Still
"A man is not old as long as he is seeking something."
- Jean Rostand
"There is a vast and important difference between a Pauline creed and a Pauline life...Tens of thousands of believers who pride themselves on their understanding of Romans and Ephesians cannot conceal the sharp spiritual contradiction that exists between their hearts and the heart of Paul.
"That difference may be stated this way: Paul was a seeker and a finder and a seeker still. They seek and find and seek no more. After 'accepting' Christ they tend to substitute logic for life and doctrine for experience."
- A. W. Tozer
- Jean Rostand
"There is a vast and important difference between a Pauline creed and a Pauline life...Tens of thousands of believers who pride themselves on their understanding of Romans and Ephesians cannot conceal the sharp spiritual contradiction that exists between their hearts and the heart of Paul.
"That difference may be stated this way: Paul was a seeker and a finder and a seeker still. They seek and find and seek no more. After 'accepting' Christ they tend to substitute logic for life and doctrine for experience."
- A. W. Tozer
Written On Your Heart
"There’s a lovely Hasidic story of a rabbi who always told his people that if they studied the Torah, it would put Scripture on their hearts. One of them asked, 'Why on our hearts, and not in them?' The rabbi answered, 'Only God can put Scripture inside. But reading sacred text can put it on your hearts, and then when your hearts break, the holy words will fall inside.'"
-Anne Lamott
So I pray we take the quotes I'm going to post and write the wisdom on our hearts, so that when our hearts break--yes, when--God's wisdom from Scripture will fill in the empty places inside and these quotes will heal the open wound.
-Anne Lamott
So I pray we take the quotes I'm going to post and write the wisdom on our hearts, so that when our hearts break--yes, when--God's wisdom from Scripture will fill in the empty places inside and these quotes will heal the open wound.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
A New Book, A Substory
With an inciting incident comes a new book in our story. A sub story if you will. This blogs current sub story is going to be quotes.
I LOVE quotes! Why use my quickly spat out thoughts when we can hear a dedicated wise author's thoughts that their brains have bled out (see Robert Pinsky's poem, Lair)? That they have labored over for possibly years? And if they put all that effort into their works (sometimes Toni Morrison would spend an entire day trying to find one word!) we can at the very least take a little time to absorb them into our souls and lives and see if they incite change in us.
So I hope you enjoy these quotes. I truly do. I wouldn't make it without them. I hope this experience makes us all the wyzer. Blessings to you all!
Love Always,
Zoe Elizabeth
I LOVE quotes! Why use my quickly spat out thoughts when we can hear a dedicated wise author's thoughts that their brains have bled out (see Robert Pinsky's poem, Lair)? That they have labored over for possibly years? And if they put all that effort into their works (sometimes Toni Morrison would spend an entire day trying to find one word!) we can at the very least take a little time to absorb them into our souls and lives and see if they incite change in us.
So I hope you enjoy these quotes. I truly do. I wouldn't make it without them. I hope this experience makes us all the wyzer. Blessings to you all!
Love Always,
Zoe Elizabeth
An Inciting Incident?
As characters in stories, otherwise known as our lives, we function as characters more than we do as just people. We experience plot, setting, exposition, conflict, climax, and resolution. Life imitating art, imitating life.
Life is a story. We are characters in not only our own story, but we are also characters in The Story as well.
And the thing about characters is they never do what the author wants them to do. They have their own ideas of right and wrong. They have strong desires. And so sometimes we veer off track. And that's what I've been doing. Until now...I hope.
Except characters don't change on their own. You can't just wake up and say, "I want to change." No, it doesn't work like that. We need something to push us in a new direction. We need conflict. Conflict is the only thing that changes a character, ask Robert McKee. And conflict only comes in what story tellers call "an inciting incident."
"James Scott Bell says an inciting incident is a doorway through which a protagonist cannot return." - Donald Miller
And right now I am praying to God every day He, the Author of my story, our story, just brought Liz to me, not just because we need each other, but because He is hoping to bring about my change. To put me on a path. A better path. A path with a bigger purpose.
I mean, after all, the point of story is character transformation, and what's gonna change me more than God working through conflict and an inciting incident. Nothing.
Liz, may you be the inciting incident that gets me back on writing's path.
Life is a story. We are characters in not only our own story, but we are also characters in The Story as well.
And the thing about characters is they never do what the author wants them to do. They have their own ideas of right and wrong. They have strong desires. And so sometimes we veer off track. And that's what I've been doing. Until now...I hope.
Except characters don't change on their own. You can't just wake up and say, "I want to change." No, it doesn't work like that. We need something to push us in a new direction. We need conflict. Conflict is the only thing that changes a character, ask Robert McKee. And conflict only comes in what story tellers call "an inciting incident."
"James Scott Bell says an inciting incident is a doorway through which a protagonist cannot return." - Donald Miller
And right now I am praying to God every day He, the Author of my story, our story, just brought Liz to me, not just because we need each other, but because He is hoping to bring about my change. To put me on a path. A better path. A path with a bigger purpose.
I mean, after all, the point of story is character transformation, and what's gonna change me more than God working through conflict and an inciting incident. Nothing.
Liz, may you be the inciting incident that gets me back on writing's path.
Friday, August 1, 2008
Finding My Way, To Church
I am honestly not sure why I don't go to church anymore. Why I am not searching for a church home. It's probably one of the most complicated parts of my life, to tell you the truth. A question I often labor over.
For one, I am not sure what I believe, so I don't know where I would look. I agree with Donald Miller about the dangers of religion, and how religion could never give me what a relationship with God and Christ gives me.
It's just that... I read Tozer. I read Augustine. I read Donald Miller. I read Anne Lamott. I've read some Max Lucado. Some C.S. Lewis. Mark Galli, Mark Batterson, Rick Warren. I read the Bible (sometimes)...and I am constantly learning what I believe. There is always more to learn.
I guess it's kinda like relationships. There are people who want to find someone to join their complete life, and there are those who want someone to complete their life. Well, first of all, my life isn't complete, I don't know what exactly I believe, and I think I want a church to join a complete me, not complete me.
I don't think there is a church in the world that could complete me. I believe that only Christ and God have that power. And I am still getting to know them, still learning about them through all these authors. Through the Bible. Through talking with God and Christ. Through this website and the writing that I do. I am discovering them through me, and I am discovering me through them.
I suppose though, and am starting more and more to believe this is true, that these authors, I believe that they have become my church.--
And we aren't even touching my health and how I don't have anything in me to leave the house.
I suppose I created my own church. I mean, I take Don with me practically everywhere. His books bring me so close to God, so close to Christ. Reading Donald Miller and all these other wise Christians is an act of worship.
So many people rely on church so much, and for a lot of them I know it can be so good to have that community, but I worry, I worry that people aren't seeking, ON THEIR OWN, God enough, Christ enough. They rely on a pastor or a group leader to do all the work for them, and you forget, or never even learned how to seek God on your own. And I feel sorry for those of you who do that. For those of you who don't know how to just pick up one of the greats on your own, from a passionate interest in your God, and read Confesssions by Augustine. Jesus, Mean and Wild by Galli.
Sometimes it isn't so much what you are doing, but WHY you are doing it. Why are you spending time with God, only when it is scheduled at a specific time? Why isn't it spontaneously fervent, ardent, blazing, burning, charged, emotional and intimate?
Which would you rather have in a relationship, someone having to pencil you into their planner sometime next week, or someone who drops everything spontaneously because they are madly in love with you and want to spend all the time they can with you, because they want to get to know you, not just know some stuff about you? I know which I would rather have...and I believe I speak truth when I say that is what God wants.
And that is what my church is like. It is quiet. It is intimate. It is me, usually in the dark of the night letting one of these authors talk about God or Christ, to light the room with. It is letting the Holy Spirit guide my hand when it is reaching toward the bookshelf, to guide me to pickup what I need to read, when I need to read it. So I can learn what God wants me to know now, not next Sunday, not next Wednesday for Bible study, but now, in this moment with Him.
And my community, the way I embrace the community of Christ, is through some key relationships, and then the other relationships, which I honestly am not good at but try at them nonetheless...slowly but surely, hopefully.
And there is this website and the other websites....now if only more people would read them, then I would be active in the Christian community. But it will come when God says it is time. I trust that. I wait patiently, content with whatever He has planned whenever He has it planned for (Philippians 4:11).
And like Anne Lamott says, I put on the pants and they fit..."because no matter how bad I am feeling, how lost or lonely or frightened, when I [read the words] of the people at my church and hear their tawny voices, I can always find my way home" (Traveling Mercies, page 55).
For one, I am not sure what I believe, so I don't know where I would look. I agree with Donald Miller about the dangers of religion, and how religion could never give me what a relationship with God and Christ gives me.
It's just that... I read Tozer. I read Augustine. I read Donald Miller. I read Anne Lamott. I've read some Max Lucado. Some C.S. Lewis. Mark Galli, Mark Batterson, Rick Warren. I read the Bible (sometimes)...and I am constantly learning what I believe. There is always more to learn.
I guess it's kinda like relationships. There are people who want to find someone to join their complete life, and there are those who want someone to complete their life. Well, first of all, my life isn't complete, I don't know what exactly I believe, and I think I want a church to join a complete me, not complete me.
I don't think there is a church in the world that could complete me. I believe that only Christ and God have that power. And I am still getting to know them, still learning about them through all these authors. Through the Bible. Through talking with God and Christ. Through this website and the writing that I do. I am discovering them through me, and I am discovering me through them.
I suppose though, and am starting more and more to believe this is true, that these authors, I believe that they have become my church.--
And we aren't even touching my health and how I don't have anything in me to leave the house.
I suppose I created my own church. I mean, I take Don with me practically everywhere. His books bring me so close to God, so close to Christ. Reading Donald Miller and all these other wise Christians is an act of worship.
So many people rely on church so much, and for a lot of them I know it can be so good to have that community, but I worry, I worry that people aren't seeking, ON THEIR OWN, God enough, Christ enough. They rely on a pastor or a group leader to do all the work for them, and you forget, or never even learned how to seek God on your own. And I feel sorry for those of you who do that. For those of you who don't know how to just pick up one of the greats on your own, from a passionate interest in your God, and read Confesssions by Augustine. Jesus, Mean and Wild by Galli.
Sometimes it isn't so much what you are doing, but WHY you are doing it. Why are you spending time with God, only when it is scheduled at a specific time? Why isn't it spontaneously fervent, ardent, blazing, burning, charged, emotional and intimate?
Which would you rather have in a relationship, someone having to pencil you into their planner sometime next week, or someone who drops everything spontaneously because they are madly in love with you and want to spend all the time they can with you, because they want to get to know you, not just know some stuff about you? I know which I would rather have...and I believe I speak truth when I say that is what God wants.
And that is what my church is like. It is quiet. It is intimate. It is me, usually in the dark of the night letting one of these authors talk about God or Christ, to light the room with. It is letting the Holy Spirit guide my hand when it is reaching toward the bookshelf, to guide me to pickup what I need to read, when I need to read it. So I can learn what God wants me to know now, not next Sunday, not next Wednesday for Bible study, but now, in this moment with Him.
And my community, the way I embrace the community of Christ, is through some key relationships, and then the other relationships, which I honestly am not good at but try at them nonetheless...slowly but surely, hopefully.
And there is this website and the other websites....now if only more people would read them, then I would be active in the Christian community. But it will come when God says it is time. I trust that. I wait patiently, content with whatever He has planned whenever He has it planned for (Philippians 4:11).
And like Anne Lamott says, I put on the pants and they fit..."because no matter how bad I am feeling, how lost or lonely or frightened, when I [read the words] of the people at my church and hear their tawny voices, I can always find my way home" (Traveling Mercies, page 55).
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